Loop Part 2 of 2

Introduction

Over the years, hell has been defined by a number of people and in a number of different ways. There is, however, one thing we can all agree on, and that, is that hell, without a doubt, is a place. What kind of place specifically you wonder? Well, that’s another story for another time because usually, we have to wait for the person experiencing hell to give us his or her perception of it. But, what about the people who don’t come back? What about the people who never make it out? Not everyone makes it out to share their story. Mr. Pool was one of the lucky ones.

My Story

Most people say hell is a dark place of torment. They say it’s hot, and I’m not talking about the hotness of a summer day. I’m talking about extreme heat, and air so thick and heavy, that it’s impossible to breath. Based on the stories shared by others, I imagined hell to be a place full of demons and creatures. I imagined piles of skeletal remains telling the many stories of those who came before and the lifeless gaunt bodies of those there in the present-too tired to even talk-punished if they did.

I guess my imagination got the better of me though, because hell, my hell, wasn’t like that at all. Well, wait a minute. That’s a lie. Now that I’m thinking about it, there was a fire. Yes, there was a fire, I just wasn’t in it very long. I can’t even tell you how many times I came stumbling out of that fire, and that’s only after I was aware that I was doing so.

It’s your turn to use your imagination. Imagine waking up to this reality where the same thing keeps happening over and over again. You come stumbling out of this fire over and over again, and it’s not just a fire. It’s a fire that erupted from an explosion!

Anyway, you’re only survivor, and after you come stumbling out of this terrible crash and fall into the extended arms of the paramedics, you’re rushed to the hospital and rushed back onto the same helicopter that just crashed. I have no idea how long this was going on for, and like I said, even after I became aware that it was happening, it happened so many times I lost count.

For me, this was hell. My personal hell wasn’t hot. There were no demons, no devils with pitchforks, and no creatures. My hell was being stuck in a repeating sequence of events. I literally woke up to this reality, and once I did, things got interesting.

Now, there are three parts to this story. There’s how I became aware or woke up, what happened when I did finally, and how I managed to get myself free.

Becoming Conscious

The crazy part concerning my sudden awareness was that I truly believe it was meant to be because when you think about it, it shouldn’t have happened. In case you’re not familiar with professional DJ equipment, I’ll explain. Professional DJ equipment like a cd player back in the day had a loop button on it.

You could take a twenty second portion from a ten-minute song and keep it replaying in a loop. If you time it perfectly, the loop is seamless. How long would it would take the crowd to realize their favorite song wasn’t actually playing, but on a twenty-second loop? Who knows, but some will eventually. Something will cause that light-bulb-moment in some of their heads.

This is what my situation was like. It was a seamless loop from the time I came stumbling out of the fire to the time I came stumbling out of the fire. How do you wake up from that? How could you when there’s nothing to lead you to believe there’s more than what you’re experiencing?

Well, I did, and it was the implementation of numbers that caused my awakening. Numbers, they’re our creator’s imprint on things, and that’s why I say my awakening was meant to be. I woke up to this horrific reality because I was supposed to. The first step to resolving any issue is to become aware of it. Right? How can you solve a problem if you’re not aware the problem exists?

Numbers. The number of the hospital room was 716, and I explained that I would never forget it because that was my birthday. I was born on the 16th day of the 7th month, July 16th. Now that I’m looking back on this, and it’s all hindsight now, I wished someone would come to the room to tell me they loved me, because subconsciously, from the repetition of this loop, I knew I wasn’t going to be in that hospital for very long. I realize this now.

Then, I saw the number 716 again because it was the number on the helicopter. When I saw that number for the second time, I had another wish. It was a different wish. I was hoping and wishing that I was actually a crab (because I was a Cancer) with an impenetrable outer shell I could retreat into, because subconsciously, probably from the repetition of the loop, I knew the crash was coming up next.

So, it was the number, 716. It was seeing the same number in two different places and having two different wishes. 716 was an alert that something was about to happen. It’s like going to bed at night and setting your alarm clock for the following morning at 7:16.

716 was the wakeup call. It was a wakeup call that I was about to leave the hospital, and it was a wakeup call the helicopter was going to crash. Instinctively, I was asking for what I needed through my hopes and wishes, and that’s how eventually, I woke up and realized I was stuck in this repeating sequence-this seamless loop of repeating events.

The Loop

Emotionally, I was all over the place once I realized I was in the loop. At first, I felt like claustrophobia was setting in-like the walls were closing in and it was hard to breath. I was anxious, and scared. Then, suddenly, all those negative emotions and feelings subsided, and I was filled with laughter and joy.

I did not ask to be here, and I did not ask to be stuck in this sequence, but I wasn’t alone. Surely, there were other people experiencing this hell with me, and the fact that I wasn’t alone provided some relief. Just some.

I begged and pleaded with the paramedics and first responders to listen to me. I tried to tell them we were all stuck in this loop-this repeating sequence of events, but they just laughed at me. They told me I was delusional from the crash, and for a brief moment, they almost convinced me that was true. I mean, from a medical standpoint, I could see why they would think that, but I knew better.

The deck was stacked against me and just getting them to listen to me was an uphill battle. They were so into their job and following procedure that I don’t even think they realized I was talking to them, but I was.

“How the hell am I going to convince them that what I’m saying is true if they won’t even listen to me,” I thought to myself. So, I decided, instead of pushing the proverbial rock up the hill, I’ll just let it go.

I wasn’t going to kill myself trying to convince them that I was going to crash in their helicopter, and once again, fall into their arms several hours from now. Screw it.

Then, I tried to play the role of the prophet. When I was in the hospital bed, and things were a little calmer, I told them I could predict the future. I told them I was a time-traveling prophet sent back to them from the future to warn them about the lives that were going to be lost in the helicopter crash.

I told them, in advance, they were going to transport me by helicopter to another hospital, and while in route, the bird would take a nosedive. They blew me off until the doctors actually made the decision to transport me.

Then, they were impressed. Yeah, I turned a few heads, but I guess they weren’t impressed enough to ever call off the helicopter. So, the sequence continued.

I tried everything. I begged them, I talked to them, and I played the roles of prophet, alien, time-traveler, and God himself. I used sarcasm, humor, and love to get through to them, but they were impenetrable like the shell I wished for.

Then, I said to myself, “You know what? I’m going to have some fun with this. Instead of stumbling out of the fire, I came out doing cartwheels, running zigzags, and doing jumping-jacks. Sometimes, I came out singing and dancing. One time, I came out of the fire moonwalking with no clothes on.

Nothing changed. They never changed. The paramedics and first responders were always standing there with their arms extended-waiting for me to fall into their clutches, and I always did. I always returned to the hospital, and they always took me in and pushed me right back out to the launch pad. In one door and out of the other.

I tried to warn the pilot and the people on the helicopter. I tried to tell them they were going to crash, but they never listened.

The helicopter always crashed, and I returned to the flames that engulfed a helicopter behind me. Instinctively, I didn’t turn around, not because I didn’t want to, but because I knew. I knew there was a helicopter engulfed by those flames.

The joy left my body, and nothing was fun anymore. I wasn’t alone, but in a sense, I really was. There was no one to play with. No one was there to laugh at me and all the silly stuff I was doing, and I had no one to laugh at.

I got sad and began to cry. The real reality was setting in, that I just gained conscious awareness only to be stuck in this frigging death loop.

Then, I got angry and filled with rage!

Like I said earlier, emotionally, I was all over the place once I realized I was in the loop, and believe me, I got it all out of my system before finally putting my thinking cap on.

Unwinding Hell

Game over, it was now time to think! I stopped joking, I stopped dancing, and I stopped reaching out to those around me. I stopped preforming and I stopped putting on a show. No one was listening to me, and there really wasn’t a lot of time. Immediately, after coming out of the fire, I thought about things. I used the time on the gurney, my time spent in the hospital, and that short ride in the helicopter before it crashed to think about what was going on.

Physically, I was going through the motions, I was on autopilot, but mentally, I was completely aware and alive. And, yes, it was difficult to keep my mouth shut when I knew exactly what was going to happen, but talking wasn’t the answer. That was clear. Whatever show I found myself in, I was definitely not the star.

I just needed to do two things I hadn’t done yet, listen, and pay attention. The loop itself was seamless, that part was true, but there were imperfections in it. The longer I thought about it the more I realized it didn’t make sense.

I came stumbling out of the fire, that’s how it always started. So, I started there. If this sequence began with me stumbling out of the fire, then that would mean the return point is the crash itself. But, how could that be? How could this sequence begin and end with the helicopter crash, even though, it seemingly did?

I replayed the events in my mind, “The helicopter crashes, I go to the hospital, and I get back in the same helicopter that crashes again?”

It didn’t make sense.

If this loop was perfect, I wouldn’t have any knowledge of the crash. If the loop was perfect, I shouldn’t experience anything twice, or at least no single event should happen twice in the same loop.

But, it did, and I did experience something twice in the loop. The number 716. You see, in order to unravel the loop, you have to find the point where the sequence is connected. Once you find that point, you can pry away until an opening is created, thus, once again allowing the free flow of events that are supposed to take place.

A loop is a circle, but it’s also an illusion. There’s supposed to be this perfect and continuous ending with a new beginning without there really being a beginning or an ending, but I had to get here someway.

Somehow, I ended up in this loop, and if it wasn’t the crash then where was the entry point?

It was the hospital. I went to the emergency room, and the doctors decided to transfer me by helicopter. When I got into the helicopter it crashed, and this never-ending loop began starting with the crash and me going back to the hospital, but I wasn’t originally in the hospital because of the crash.

My life, or the timeline of my life got twisted with someone else’s, and I knew that because I didn’t die in the helicopter crash. It obviously wasn’t my time to die.

Now I knew, the timeline of my life got twisted with someone else’s timeline, and that was God’s plan because I didn’t die in a horrific helicopter crash. I was now in someone else’s timeline because I was supposed to be there, I was supposed to wake up, and I was supposed to save a life.

But, whose timeline, and how could I save them or him or her if no one was listening to me? Those were the questions.

I don’t even know how many more times I had to go back in that helicopter before realizing what I had to do, I just knew that every return was another chance for me to experiment. It was another opportunity to take what I retained from the previous loop and continue building until I perfected this thing.

Finally, the light bulb lit up in my skull, and instead of running over that guy who was still mumbling something despite loosing the lower half of his body in the crash, I decided to bend down and listen to what he was trying to say.

He was the pilot, and he was the only person in this entire sequence of events who was actually trying to talk to me. See, I didn’t need to convince anyone of anything, I just needed to listen.

When I bent over, he said to me, “We didn’t have to die today, but tell my wife I love her.”

We didn’t have to die today?

What did he mean?

It took a while, but I got it right.

They were rushing me out of the hospital and onto the launchpad. As they brought the wheelchair lift down slowly to accommodate me, I noticed the number on the helicopter.

716 was the number, and I’ll never forget it because I was born on the 16th day of the 7th month. Yup, July 16th. I was a Cancer.

When I got in the helicopter, I motioned for the pilot to come to me like the paramedics and first responders had done so many times before.

He did, and when he got close enough he put his hand on my shoulder. I pointed towards the gauges of his flying machine. He looked and realized the helicopter was out of gas.

-F.J.L

Loop is a short story fiction piece written by Francis Joseph LaManna.